14. This Is the Finance Department: Despair Arc

Adam and Beatrice vanished off together somewhere.

Left alone to clear the rubble, Chloe was still grinning to herself.

'...Aren't I smiling a little too much?'

'I'm just happy because Adam said he trusts me. There's nothing else to it.'

'Really?'

'Of course.'

Dodging Future Chloe's withering stare inside her head, Chloe swept the debris aside with [Jade Shackles].

The thing Adam had said—that he trusted her, that he relied on her.

She couldn't quite understand why a few short words could make her this happy.

'Back at the research institute, I was the one begging him to rely on me.'

'That's right... It's been a long time since I heard anything like that from Adam.'

'Did he say it often in the future?'

'No. That was the problem. In the end, I could never overcome that menopausal bitch's shadow.'

Future Chloe was nothing more than a mental construct, but the expression on her face was impossibly complex.

Shame, rage, disgust, self-loathing, jealousy—all swirled together.

Emotions she had felt for so long that they had simply become her norm.

Dark and heavy feelings.

'...Adam never relied on me. He only accepted me as a comrade after I'd been chasing his back for ages.'

'What? Was Adam not 1st Rank back then? Did he have other companions?'

'Don't be ridiculous. Adam stayed 1st Rank the whole time, and he traveled alone. He turned me down when I said I'd follow him, and roamed the continent by himself.'

'......'

'He told me that if I followed him, I'd just die too. Said I should live my own life.'

Future Chloe spoke of that future with an unnerving calm.

This was exactly the sort of thing she had tried not to discuss, worried about mental assimilation.

Maybe the mood had carried her away. Or maybe she'd decided this much was safe.

Chloe listened quietly to her future self's words.

...Anything involving Adam wasn't something Chloe could afford to let slip by.

'Even so, I was the one who followed him to the bitter end. I tried to help in secret—used magic to assist without ever letting him notice.'

'Adam never knew?'

'He's 1st Rank. Unless it's a large-scale spell, he can't even sense the prelude to magic. Still... he somehow always knew I was tailing him. He did try to shake me off, but every attempt failed. Eventually, he accepted me as a comrade.'

'That's...'

'I was happy. Just the fact that Adam needed me made me truly happy. But it didn't last long.'

'Why?'

'I quickly realized that menopausal bitch still loomed large inside Adam. The despair I felt the first time I understood that...'

Future Chloe was smiling. A smile aimed squarely at herself.

'...You said you were too embarrassed to even talk properly.'

'I was. And because of that, I thought if I threw myself even more desperately into helping him, he'd turn around and look at me first. What a stupid thought.'

Deep regret. Pure self-hatred.

The way Future Chloe spoke—it felt less like maturity and more like something thoroughly worn down.

Chloe, momentarily at a loss for words, swallowed quietly.

There was something she'd been wanting to ask for a while.

'Hey, future me.'

'What?'

'Ever since I first met you, and now listening to this, there's a question I've been holding onto. You don't have to answer. Just let me ask.'

'Go ahead.'

'You.'

After graduating from the academy.

'Did you not return to the Magic Tower?'

'......'

'I mean, think about it. The Chairwoman died and the academy collapsed, right? And after that, you chased after Adam. Which means you never went back to the Magic Tower.'

'......'

'Why? The whole reason you came to Grandis Academy in the first place was because of the internal politics at the Tower—your teacher told you to lie low here for a while. Once you graduated, wouldn't you be supposed to return?'

An answer did come to mind: Adam mattered more than the Tower. Given Future Chloe's obsession, that wasn't hard to understand.

But that was precisely why it didn't add up.

'You could've just brought Adam ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to the Empire too. Or at least gotten help from your teacher, couldn't you?'

'...Hah.'

'Why? No—why does the Magic Tower never even come up?'

Not a word about what happened to the Tower in the future, or what became of her teacher. Only stories about Adam, the Chairwoman, and a handful of others.

It didn't make sense. Right now she was at the academy, but Chloe had spent her whole life in the Empire and at the Magic Tower. She'd barely been at the academy half a year—hadn't she spent years at the Tower?

Yet Future Chloe only ever spoke of the academy days. The dissonance was impossible to ignore.

'My teacher, huh.'

'Can you answer? Or are you going to stay silent?'

If she answered, fine. And if she stayed silent, that itself would yield information.

Future Chloe refused to disclose the future because she was afraid her mind would fully assimilate with the present Chloe's. The more crucial the future event, the harder she tried not to speak of it.

So if she clammed up about the Magic Tower and her teacher, that could be interpreted to mean that future was particularly significant.

Chloe had asked with that reasoning in mind.

'Teacher, teacher, the Archmage. The Empire's 8th Rank.'

'...What about her?'

'A remarkable person. A great mage. The first to establish a Magic Tower—she'll go down in the Empire's history as a hero.'

'......'

'But that's all. Just... that.'

Future Chloe answered. But there was an ambiguity to it, as if she'd answered nothing at all.

Why did she react that way about the Tower and her teacher? If it had been outright hostility, Chloe could've guessed something catastrophic had happened. But Future Chloe's attitude was far more nebulous—seemingly favorable yet somehow negative, and impossible to gauge whether it pointed to a critical future event.

After muttering something inscrutable for a moment, Future Chloe spoke.

'If you're really that curious, check for yourself.'

'What?'

'When you reach this level, you start to sense certain things. A presence, I suppose... An incredibly powerful presence is heading this way from the Empire.'

'W-wait. You mean.'

'Who do you think? The teacher you're so desperate to find.'

Why would her teacher come to the academy? So abruptly?

Chloe went blank for a second at Future Chloe's words, then realized something and murmured under her breath.

'...The terror attack.'

'The teacher and the Chairwoman know each other personally. She's probably coming as a sort of Empire representative.'

'But I already report to her every week through the magic tool. Even if she came in person...'

'At this point, seeing her in person is better.'

'What?'

'For a lot of reasons.'

Future Chloe said nothing more. Just silence.

Chloe considered pressing her uncooperative future self for answers, but only for a moment.

Because someone was sprinting toward her from a distance.

"Pisti! Pisti!"

"...Dean?"

From the Empire's Magic Tower, now head of the Magic Department—Dean Villend.

They'd met and spoken occasionally, drawn together by their shared Tower origins.

He was approaching now, his aged body in a hurry, his expression markedly grim.

Why?

A nameless unease made Chloe's body tremble.

*

Amatrius Delphia Beatrice found her days lately novel and delightful.

Someone asked: Had she really overcome her chronic illness? If she kept collapsing from mana exhaustion, wasn't she just going to die?

Someone whispered: She's here as a hostage anyway, so why is she making a spectacle of herself? Wouldn't it be better to stay quiet?

Someone mocked: Is the Fourth Princess really working in work clothes at a grocer's?

The stares and words of others—she had heard them all, countless times.

But Beatrice was free of all of it now.

'It's strange.'

Fate was a truly strange thing.

When she'd first been chosen as a hostage from the kingdom, everything had felt hopeless. "Chosen" wasn't even accurate—she'd been pushed out.

A princess with talent but a chronic illness that made her magic uncontrollable. The royal family had long since abandoned any expectations they'd once held for Beatrice.

Over a decade of efforts at the kingdom level had yielded no progress. Of course, for a small kingdom whose court mages barely scraped the threshold of 7th Rank, there were limits to what they could even attempt.

In the end, Beatrice was treated as dead weight. Her fate was to be sold off in a political marriage to another nation, propped up by her beautiful face and large chest. Before that, her last useful act was this academy—functionally a hostage posting.

'So I tried everything to go back.'

While she was stuck at this academy in a foreign land, it seemed all too likely that back home they'd settle her next fate without her. So she'd tried to return to the kingdom—to do something, anything—and had approached the Finance Director with bribes, hoping to secure a meeting with the Chairwoman.

She hadn't expected that meeting to change everything.

"...Finance Director."

"Yes?"

"I just wanted to say your name."

The Finance Director, Adam Caines.

Beatrice's fate felt as though she had lived through all that despair solely to meet this person.

The chronic illness that had given her hope and then plunged her straight into despair—it was resolved. If that were all, she would have simply regarded him as her lifelong benefactor. But the man himself was a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠contradiction.

He helped others while utterly neglecting himself. Beatrice's gaze drifted to his front pocket—the military-grade stimulant she'd glimpsed at the dormitory was still tucked there.

He ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠swallowed things like that to focus on his work, and lived alone in that shabby, dingy dormitory. Despite being crushed under an excessive workload every day, he still skimped on sleep and rest to keep studying finance.

A person who lived that relentlessly. She simply couldn't stand idly by. She wanted to help, in any way she could.

That was why she and her maid Susanne had been giving him her jewelry, bit by bit. Under the name of bribes, though she wanted him to use it for himself more than anything.

'I did say I'd contacted the stimulant merchant.'

She was a Fourth Princess—she had at least that much influence. She'd already told the merchant to sell cheaply even at a loss, so Adam should have saved some money.

Satisfaction welled up in her for no particular reason. Was this what nobles felt when they patronized impoverished scholars or artists?

'His skin looks a little better.'

Had he been eating properly? Surely he'd used the money she gave him to buy himself something. Thinking that put her in a fine mood for work.

The sums were small, but she was slowly accumulating them. Should she use them to buy him a fountain pen?

Picturing Adam's cheap pen, Beatrice grinned.

"Anyway, please accept these. You'll be well supplied going forward."

"Thank you, Princess Beatrice."

"...Think nothing of it."

If she kept building rapport like this, an opportunity to extract Adam from the academy would surely come one day. She couldn't explain why, but she felt certain that if she could bring Adam back to the Delphia Kingdom with her, she could alter fate on a far grander scale.

Toward that end, she'd been trying to meet the Student Council President through Milia, whom she'd met during the uninhabited island midterm exam.

'That female student next to Adam earlier—that was definitely Milia.'

She'd been hard to reach lately. What had she been doing with Adam in the meantime?

She'd already gotten all the information she needed about the Student Council, so there was no pressing need to keep the connection, but Milia was still one of her few contacts. Beatrice was also fairly sure the girl was hiding her true identity.

So she simply asked Adam outright.

"By the way, wasn't that Milia next to you earlier?"

"You know her? Ah—you were in the same group during the midterm exam, weren't you?"

"Yes. I haven't seen her lately, so I was surprised to see her suddenly beside you, Finance Director."

"Hmm... Student Milia is currently helping our department because she hasn't been able to pay her tuition. Today was part of that."

"Ah."

In that case, there was no need to pay it any mind. More than Milia, Beatrice wanted to ask about the Student Council President, Kassandra. She'd heard that Adam and Kassandra had a personal connection.

But suddenly bringing up Kassandra out of nowhere would seem odd. He might take it as her trading these jewels for information.

Beatrice didn't want that. Of course she wanted something from him, but she had no interest in a purely businesslike relationship with Adam.

Even with a touch of self-interest mixed in, she wanted him to understand that it was ultimately goodwill.

"...Your Highness, a moment."

"Susanne? Finance Director, I—"

"Please go ahead. I'll wait here."

Beatrice had been hoping to talk with Adam a little longer for precisely that reason, but the sudden arrival of her maid Susanne broke the flow.

Susanne had tended to Beatrice for years. She was sharp, and wouldn't interrupt a conversation without good reason.

Which meant this was urgent enough that Susanne had to interrupt.

"A message has arrived from the Delphia Kingdom. Through an unofficial channel, of course."

"The kingdom wasn't alerted, I trust?"

"They were not, but for safety's sake, we will not be able to use this channel again. In any case, the homeland reports that..."

"What?"

"...His Highness the Crown Prince is coming to the academy."

"Excuse me? My brother?"

Beatrice could not bring herself to believe the words.

The Crown Prince of the Delphia Kingdom, the next sovereign—her half-brother, Fourth Princess Beatrice's sibling by a different mother.

The man she knew.

For a great many reasons, he was someone she had absolutely no desire to see.

*

While the two female students were flustered for their own respective reasons.

Milia, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠left abandoned in the middle of the street.

'I want to go back and rest.'

Nobody had told her she could leave, and she had no choice but to wait with no clear idea of when they'd return.

Cursing Adam—who had vanished into the grocer's with that work-clothes princess to do god-knows-what—she slumped against a wall and crouched down.

She wanted to go home from work...